The snail (@) is a fundamental symbol to write email addresses: here is how to make it on pc, Mac and foreign keyboards.
How to make the snail on the pc keyboard? Even today many users ask themselves this question. In fact, this special symbol is essential for anyone who wants to send an email, enter their email address to register on a site, or even to create a secure password, difficult to guess. When we look for information on this symbol, or when we give someone our email address, we pronounce the @ symbol by saying “snail”. In English, however, this symbol is called “at”. It is a meaning related to its function in electronic mail, to write to someone who is at a particular address (email). In Italian, however, the name comes from its unmistakable shape, that of a snail.
However, looking at our keyboard, it is not easy to identify the snail at once: it is located in the same key as ò, between the L key and the à key. So how do you do the snail on the PC? You need a key combination, but don’t worry: you only need two. In this article we will explain step by step how to do the snail on the PC, Mac and also with the virtual keyboard of the computer.
How to do the snail on the PC
To type the snail on the keyboard of the PC just hold down the AltGr button (the one on the right) and press the key with the snail. This way the @ symbol will appear immediately within your text. The two keys are very close to each other: by pressing AltGr with your thumb you can comfortably reach the snail with your index finger.
How to make the snail on Mac
As we have seen, this is a very simple and easy to memorize key combination, but the beauty does not end there: making the snail on the Mac is even simpler. In this case, in fact, you can press both Alt keys, i.e. the one to the right of the space bar (as on a Windows PC) and the one to the left (which is not possible on another operating system) + the key with the snail symbol.
How to do the snail on foreign keyboards
We have seen so far how to do the snail on the PC when the keyboard is set to the Italian language: in most cases, in fact, the default setting of your PC (if purchased in Italy) is just that. However, if you have ordered a PC online from a European country or if your keyboard is set to English, you may have difficulty finding the snail and typing it with the key combination we learned earlier.
In fact, on the English keyboard you need to hold down the Shift key (up arrow) + the number two. Only in this case you will be able to type the snail. If you look at your physical English keyboard, you’ll notice that the @ symbol is right above the 2 key.
Finally, even though this is a rather long method compared to the ones listed so far, it’s good to know that the snail can also be inserted into a text indirectly. How? By manually inserting the symbol. If you are working on a text editor like Word, for example, you can go to the path Insert > Insert Symbols and look for the @.
Now that you have learned how to make snail on the pc keyboard you are ready to send emails to friends and parants with a few simple clicks.